DOCUMENT RESUME ED 232 201 CS 207 753 AUTHOR Glasser
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DOCUMENT RESUME ED 232 201 CS 207 753 AUTHOR Glasser, Theodore L. TITLE Objectivity and the Ideology of News. pus DATE Mar 83 NOTE 17p.; Lecture delivered at an "Ethics in Journalism" Seminar (University of Minnesota, March 3-4, 1983). PUB TYPE Speeches/Conference Papers (150)-- Viewpoints (120) EDRS PRICE MF01/PC01 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS *Bias; Court Litigation; *Ethics; *Freedomof Speech; *Journalism; *News Reporting; News Writing; *Social Responsibility ABSTRACT A 1977 t.:ourt of Appeals decision, "Edwardsv. National Audubon Society," outlined the principleof "neutral reportage": the press is not required tosuppress newsworthy statements by public officials merely because the truthof those statements is doubtful. The author outlines this courtcase because it illustrates so well theconsequences of the ethic of objectivity that has developed in journalism since the rise of themass press in the 1800s. Originally a response to economicpressures, objectivity has become an ideal to strive for. Inan effort to remain free from unrecognized prejudgments, journalists have concentratedon reporting rather than interpreting news, using themselves largelyas vehicles for their sources' arguments, rebuttals, explanations,and criticisms. Nevertheless, their reportingreveals bias. In relying on official sources, reporters favor the prominentand established. Trying to record rather than interpret, journalistsundervalue independent thinking as they obscure theirown role in choosing and editing news. This ethic of objectivity is foundedon a naive belief in a single reality derived from empiricalfacts. American journalism will not become truly responsible until it recognizesthat facts and values are inseparable. (MM) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRSare the best that can be made from the original document. *********************************************************************** U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER IERICI OBJECTIVITY AND THE IDEOLOGY OF NEWS 74.,..This document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization onginating it Minor changes have ben made io improve r""I zeprodmmnquatY Theodore L. Glasser Points of view or opinions stated in this docu CD ment do not necessarily represent official NIE (%1 position or policy. (NJ University of Minnesota PeN CJ I would like to begin by outlining my conclusions and then, given C:3 LAJ the constraints of time, try to explain how I arrived at those conclusions. First,let me define a few terms. By objectivity Imean something broader and more encompassing than impartiality and fairness. By objectivity I mean a particular view of journalism and the press,a frame of reference used by journalists to orient themselves in the newsroom and in the community.By objectivity I mean, to a degree, ideology; where ideology is defined as a kind of secular religion,a set of beliefs that function as the journalist's "claim to action." As a set of beliefs, objectivity appears to be rooted in a positivist view of the world, an enduring commitment to the supremacy of observable and retrievable facts. This commitment, in turn, impinges on the newspaper's principal commodity--the day's news. Thus my argument, in part, is this: today's news is indeed biased--as it must inevitably be--and this bias can be best understood by understanding the concept, the conventions, and the ethic of objectivity. Lecture delivered atan "Ethics in Journalism" seminar co-sponsored by Augsburg College and the University of Minnesota's Minnesota Journalism Center, March 3-4, 1983. "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GPANTED BY Theodore L. Glasser TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)." Specifically, objectivity in journalismaccounts for--or at least helps us understand--threeprincipal developmentsin American journalism; and each of thesedevelopments contributes to the biasor ideology of news. First, objective reporting is biased againstwhat the press typically definesas its role ih a democracy--that of a Fourth.Estate, the watchdog role,an adversary press. Indeed, objectivity in journalism is biased infavor of the status citio;it is inherently conservative to theextent that it encourages reporters to rely on what sociologist AlvinGouldner so appropriately describesas the "managers of the statusquo"--the prominent and the elite. Second, objective reporting is biased againstindependent thinking; it emasculates the intellect by treating itas a disinterested 4ectator. Finally, objective reporting is biasedagainst the very idea of responsibility; the day's news is viewedas something journalists are compelled to report, not something theyare responsible for creating. ,This last point, I think, ismost important. Despite a renewed interest in professional ethics, ethics injournalism continue to evade questions of morality and responsibility. Of course, this doesn't mean that journalistare immoral. Rather, it means that journalist today are largely amoral;and certainly the amorality of journalism is centraltoa seminar devoted to the subject of journalistic ethics. My main conclusion is simply this:objectivity in journalism effectively erodes the very moral foundationwhich rests on a responsible press. 2 It may seem somewhat ofa paradox for me to argue that the ethic of objectivity undermines ethicsin journalism. But Ihope to demonstrate that this is nota paradox at all because, in the end, objectivity is not an ethic. The Concept and Conventions of Objective Reporting By most any account of the history ofobjectivity in journalism-- and there have been many--objectivereporting began more as a commercisal imperative thanas a standard of responsible reporting. With the emergence of a truly popularpress in the mid-1800s--the penney press--a press neithr.tr tied to the politicalparties nor the business elite, objectivity provideda presumably disinterested view of the world. But the penney press didn't literallycause objective reporting. It was one of many social, economic,political, and technological forces that converged in the mid andlate 1800s to bring about fundamental and lasting changes in Americanjournalism. There was the advent of the telegraph, which forthe first time separated communication from transportation.There were radical changes in printing technology, including thesteampowered press and later the rotary press. There was the formation of tr! AssociatedPress, an early effort by publishers to monopolizea new technology--in this case the telegraph. There was, finally, the demise of communityand 3 the rise of society; therewere now cities, properly defined as "human: settlements" where "strangers are likely to meet." These are some of the many conditions that created the climate for objective reporting, a climate best understood in terms of the emergence of a new mass press and the need for that press to operate efficiently in the marketplace. Efficiency is the key term here, for efficiency is the central meaning of objective reporting. It was efficient for the Associate Press to distribute only the "bare facts," and leave the opportunity for interpretation to individual members of the cooperative. It was efficient for newspapers not to offend readers and advertisers with partisan prose. It was efficient--perhaps expedient--for reporteres to distance themselves from the sense and substance of what they. reported. To survive in the marketplace, and to enhance its status as a new and more democratic press, journalists-- principally publishers, who were becoming a more and more removed from the editing and writing process--began to transform efficiency into a standard of professional competenc, a standard later--several decades later--described in terms of objectivity. This transformation was aided by two important developments in early twentieth century: first, Oliver Wendell Holmes' effort to employ a marketplace metaphor to define the meaning of the First Amendment; and second, the growing popularity of the 4 scientific method as the proper tool with which todiscover and understand an increasinglyalien reality. In a dissenting opinion in 1919, Holmes popularizedthe marketplace of ideas, a metaphor introduced by John Milton several centuries earlier. Metaphor or not, publishers took it quite literally. They argued--and continuewith essentially thesame argument today--that theiropportunity to compete and ultimately survive in the marketplace is their First Amendmentright, a Constitutional privilege. The American Newspaper Publishers Association, organized in 1887, led the cause of a freepress. In the name of freedom of the press, theANPA fought the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 on behalf of its adverisers; it foughtthe Post Office Act of 1912, which compelled sworn statements of ownership andcirculation and thus threatened to reveal too much to advertisers;it fought efforts to regulate child labor,which world interfer with the control and exploitation of paper boys; it fought the collectivebargaining provisions of the Wttional Recovery Act in the mid-1930's; forsimilar reasons, it stood opposed tothe American Newspaper Guild,the reporters' urion; it tried--fortunatlyunsuccessfully--to prevent the wire services from sellingnews to radio stations until after publication in the nearbynewspaper. Beyond using the First Amendment to shield and protectits economic interests in the marketplace,publisherswere also able to use the canons of science to justify--indeed,legitimate--the